Filling in the Hole
by Hoedogg
Summary: Not nearly as dirty as the title might imply. Buffy disguises a wake as a party and allows herself to feel the pain from losing Spike and Sunnydale. A one-chapter standalone.


A/N:  Please be gentle, as this is my first and quite possibly last Buffy fic ever.  I simply needed more closure than the final episode offered.

This fic was partially inspired by The Smiths song "William It Was Really Nothing", although you'll see no evidence of that whatsoever as you read it.    
TITLE: " Filling in the Hole"  
AUTHOR: Hoedogg  
RATING: PG-13, 'cause it's much less naughty than my usual work.  
DISTRIBUTION: Just ff.net for now.  
SUMMARY: Takes place immediately after the final episode.  Buffy allows herself to feel the pain of losing Spike and Sunnydale.  Told in the present tense from Buffy's POV.  I hope that doesn't prove too annoying.  
WARNING: Contains S1-S7 spoilers.   
DISCLAIMER: "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and its characters do not belong to me. They belong to Joss Whedon and UPN, and maybe some other people too, I don't know.

***

"So.  What are we gonna do now?"

I don't know.  Stare at the sinkhole that used to be home?  Home is gone.  Swallowed by the hellmouth.  Hadn't thought about what to do or where to go when home was gone.

A light.  A smile.  An answer.

"What are we going to do now?  I'll tell you what we're going to do.  We're going to party."

Blank looks.  They think you're nutty, Slayer.  Home is gone.  People you knew for years are gone.  People on the bus right now are wounded.  This is no time to party.

A solitary laugh.  Giles.

"Buffy, it is nice to see that you've still got your wit about you at a time like this."

No wit.

"No, Giles, I'm serious.  It's party time.  Load everybody back onto the bus.  We're going to start rolling, and we're not going to stop until we find a fully stocked bar."

Questioning looks.  Faith approaches, discreetly.

"Um, what's up with this, B?  We've got some seriously wounded people here, and instead of finding the nearest hospital you want to hit a roadhouse?"

"Hospital.  Bar.  What's the difference?  They both treat pain."

Faith backs off.  Gives a knowing look, as tender a look as she is capable of giving.

"Why do I get the feeling that you're not talking about the pain from that stab wound in your gut?"

No answer for her.

"Ah, I get it.  Mum's the word.  Keeping up the tough Slayer façade.  That's cool, B.  I'll play along.  We'll get the bus rolling.  But you gotta promise me that we'll drop our casualties off at St. Whoever's before we get tanked.  Trust me, Wood and a couple of the others won't last if we don't."

"Fair enough."

She turns to face them.  They will listen to her.

"Alright, gang.  Back on the bus.  Time to haul ass and leave this crater in our dust."

Giles approaches her.

"Faith, please assure me that we are going to get these people the necessary medical treatment."

"Yes, we are.  I assure you."

Everything is under control.

There is time for one last glance at what used to be Sunnydale, home.  But only a brief amount of time.

"Come on, B.  Let's roll."

***

Giles drives the bus.  Stops at a hospital on the outskirts of San Francisco.

It looks clean.  Safe.  Peaceful.  Nothing like Sunnydale those last few months.

Are the people here even slightly aware of what happened just miles down the road from them?  Did they even notice the stream of cars filled with former Sunnydale residents exiting en masse?

Probably not.  This is a big place, a big city.  Traffic is nothing foreign to them.

This is a big place, a big state.  Earthquakes threaten to break it apart almost every year.  The hellmouth was probably just another thing.  And Buffy just another girl, an urban legend.  Her friends?  Unknown to them.

Or is that the loneliness talking again, the loneliness that came into existence the moment the news broke?

"Into each generation a Slayer is born."

Just one back then.  Now many.  No need to feel the pain of loneliness anymore.

But not all pain is loneliness.

***

Dawn volunteers to stay behind at the hospital and keep up with the progress of the wounded.  She turns on her cell phone so she can be reached in case of an emergency.

Everything has been taken care of.  It's time to go to the bar.  Now.

"Let's move, Giles."

"Buffy, please reconsider.  There are any number of reasons why we shouldn't do this now, not the least of which is that most of these girls aren't even twenty-one yet."

Faith cuts in to refresh his memory.

"I got 'em fake ID's, remember?  You know, that time I took 'em to the Bronze and got 'em drunk, and Buffy got all mad at me?"

He sniffs indignantly.

Scare him into it.

"Giles, if you don't drive this bus to the nearest bar, then so help me I'll do it.  And you've seen the way I drive a car."

His eyes widen.

"Yeah.  Now just think about how scary it would be if I tried to drive this bus, with its rickety stick shift and sensitive clutch."

"Good heavens, perish the thought.  Alright, I'll do it, Buffy, but I don't understand the point of it all.  I think finding a place to stay would prove to be a much more productive use of our time."

"Hey.  We've all got our opinions."

He glares, but only a bit.  Once he was the Watcher, the leader.  Now he is merely one of the followers, albeit the one whose opinion is the most respected yet, sadly, ignored.

"Right then."

He turns the key and shifts into first gear.

***

Appropriately, the first watering hole they find is named the _Road House_.  Faith grins.

"Looks like my kinda place, B."

"Not very original with the name, but at least they didn't make with the false advertising."

The weary unwounded step feebly off the bus and into the seedy bar.  Xander rubs his rumbling belly.

"My goodness.  Killing uber-vamps has really worked up an appetite."

He looks at a skeletal woman in a cocktail waitress's outfit and raises his finger.

"Ma'am, do you sell any steaks or other forms of meat in this fine establishment?"

She looks at him quizzically.

"No, sugar.  We just sell drinks."

His shoulders slump.

She looks apologetic.

"I can bring you some pretzels if you like."

"Ah yes.  Pretzels and booze.  Just the victory dinner I was hoping for after having waged full-on war for months against an evil capable of destroying the world.  Could we not have found a Longhorn or something, Buffy?"

"Sorry.  But the alcohol will act faster on our empty stomachs."

He looks a bit concerned.

"Geez, Buff, I've never known you to be all about the drinky drinky.  What gives?"

He's got to be kidding, right?  What gives?  His on-again off-again lover for the past four years just died and all he can think about is his growling tummy?  Can't he understand why they're all there?  To kill the pain, Xander, you idiot.  Don't you feel any pain right now?

"Sit down, Xander.  Let me buy you a drink.  We'll talk about it."

"That's the best offer I've had all day.  Of course, considering the day I've had thus far, that's not saying much."

He smiles that warm, winning Xander smile.  The eyepatch takes nothing away from it.

The waitress makes her way to the table.

"What can I get you to drink?"

"Jack Daniels on the rocks for me.  What are you having, Xander?"

"Jack on the rocks works for me too.  Maybe throw a little Coke in there with it."

"Coming right up."

The waitress leaves, and Xander's eye is glimmering, expectant.  He wants an explanation, but it isn't time to talk to him yet.  Must have alcohol first.

***

Drinks arrive.  Giles was generous enough to set up a tab for the whole gang.  Drinks are on him for the rest of the night.

"So, Buffy.  What's our motivation?  Why are we here?"

The whiskey slides down smoothly.  Its burning sensation feels right.

"I told you.  To party."

"Come on, Buff.  We don't have the strength to party right now, nor the desire."

"That's what the alcohol is for."

He sighs.

"I don't get it.  Why?"

Don't snap at him.  Just control your answer.

"Because we just saved the world.  Again.  And we've never really had time for a save-the-world party before.  Something always came up.  Either I left town, or I died, or Willow had to go to witch rehab.  It's always something."

It's not exactly the truth, but it seems to satisfy him.  He smiles.

"You know what?  It's a little zany, but it makes sense.  We saved the world.  Why not celebrate?"

Force a smile for him in return.  Maybe he'll figure it out for real later.

"All we need is to procure a little music and get one idiot on the dancefloor to start a chain reaction.  And I think I'm pretty capable of handling both those duties, if you'll excuse me for a moment."

He steps over to the jukebox.

Willow approaches.

"You feeling okay, Buffy?"

"Fine.  Better now that I've got this Jack in me."

"What?  Oh, you mean the drink.  Heh."

Her eyes widen a bit with concern.

"Listen, Buffy, you might want to pace yourself.  After all, you've got kind of a gaping tummy wound thing going on there."

"Don't worry about me, Will."

She chews her lip.

"I do worry, Buffy.  You're hurt, and plus..."

"Plus what?"

She swallows.

"Plus you were the last one out.  You were the only one who saw what happened down there at the hellmouth.  So…"

"So what?"

Willow gets that nervous look in her eye and fidgets like she's thinking of something inappropriate to ask, but she knows she's going to ask it anyway.

"What happened, exactly?"

Spike.  Medallion.  Heat.  Light.  World-saving energy, pouring from his soul, draining him of life.

"Nothing."

"What?"

"Not nothing.  I don't know.  A bunch of stuff.  It all happened so fast."

She looks nervous again.

"Spike was with you, wasn't he?"

Swallow.

"Yes.  For a while.  I had to leave him though."

"Why didn't he come with you?"

Swallow harder.

"He…he couldn't."

"Oh.  Right.  Duh.  I'm so sorry, Buffy."

You can tell from her eyes.  Willow's figured it out faster than Xander.  This is a wake, not a party.

Her hand is comforting.  Not just in a physical contact kind of way.  Must be some residual effect from that White Magick.

Still, it would be too draining to go into depth about Spike right now.  Change the subject.

"So, Kennedy got beaten up pretty badly, didn't she?  How come she's here and not at the hospital?"

"Same reason as you, Buffy.  In her own words, she's one tough bitch and there's no way in hell she's going to miss this celebration."

Give Willow a genuine smile for that one.

"She's a good kid.  You two are good together."

Willow frowns a bit.

"Yeah.  Sometimes I still miss Tara though.  But I'm getting used to it."

Missing people.  It's different from loneliness, sort of.  Losing them and knowing you'll never get them back.  Mom.  Spike.  Gone.

That is pain.

"Waitress, I need another Jack on the rocks here."

Willow looks uneasy.  She looks like she's plotting a getaway.

"Oh, you're having another drink already?  Right, well, um, you probably want to talk to Xander.  I mean, you will want to, when he comes back from the jukebox.  Won't you?"

She gives a little wave and turns back to her waiting lover.

"Wait, Will…"

Look deep into her eyes.  Look.  You can tell.  She sees the pain.  She sees in you what she felt when she lost Tara.

"I know, Buffy.  You'll be okay.  We all love you.  You know that, right?"

She always has a way of making people feel better by saying the simplest things.

"Of course."

***

The waitress returns with the second drink, as a classic rock tune begins piping through the speakers.

Xander makes his way back to the table.

"Ahem.  _Jungle Love_?"

"Hey, don't knock the Steve Miller Band."

"I dunno, Xander, I always took you for more of an angsty modern-rock type of guy."

"Well, the jukebox in this place didn't exactly have the widest selection.  It was either classic rock or country."

"Ah.  Then you made the right decision."

***

Two drinks and it's better than it was before.

People are dancing even though Xander didn't start the trend.  Faith is grinding on some heavily tattooed biker-looking dude.  Giles is chatting it up with the cocktail waitress.  Willow and Kennedy are fooling around.  Most of the younger girls are whooping it up and having a great time.  Thank goodness for youthful exuberance and non-existent tolerances.

Andrew looks sad.  He took his best friend's life.  He saw Anya's taken in battle.  Pain.  

A couple of the young Slayers are comforting him.  After all, he's a battle hero now.

He seems somewhat receptive to their advances.  He'll be okay.  Eventually.

Two drinks and it's better than it was before, but not as good as it could be.

"Waitress, could I get another Jack on the rocks over here?"

***

Five drinks and it's time to dance.

"Xander, get up.  Come shake your booty with me."

"About time!  You know I could have had my pick of Slayers-in-Training by now."

"Gotta drop the 'In-Training' part from here on out, remember?"

"Oh yeah."

Standing up and dancing with him in the dark lights of the _Road House_ brings back memories of the _Bronze_.  Gone now, save for the memories.  Just like the rest of Sunnydale.

"I'm going to miss it, you know?"

He pulls back.

"Miss what?  Sunnydale?"

"Yeah.  I know it wasn't the greatest place in the world.  The job market was atrocious, the property values stunk, and it was crawling with demons.  But for seven years, it was our home.  Our beloved little town atop the hellmouth."

He chuckles wistfully.

"Gosh, it was my home for even longer than that.  I wonder if my family made it out of there okay.  I really lost touch with them after the wedding fell through."

Another thing you never thought about, the very real possibility that he'll never hear from his family again regardless of whether they're alive or dead.  And the same goes for Willow.  Either their families were sucked into the hellmouth, or they've moved on, assuming that their children were lost in the sinkhole.

"I'm so sorry, Xander."

"Ah, forget about it.  I think we would have lost touch regardless of what happened."

His eye still seems far away.  
"Anything else on your mind?"

"The wedding.  My family and I, we lost touch after it.  Everyone was so pissed at me.  Especially her.  God, I was such a putz for that, wasn't I?"

"Not gonna argue.  Walking out on Anya?  Not exactly your primo moment on this earth."

"I would give anything to go back and do it differently.  All the pain I caused her…"

Pain.  Now we're getting somewhere.

"But she forgave you."

"Eventually, yes."

He sighs.

"I just don't get it, Buffy.  I loved her.  I know I did.  But it wasn't marriage-love, for whatever reason.  I can't explain it."

"Trust me, I understand.  Remember who you're talking to.  Fellow lover of the souled undead, right here."

He smiles for the first time in a while.

"Oh yeah, Angel and…Spike."

And just like that, his smile is gone.

Slowly pull him closer so that if the tears come you can let them soak into his shoulder.

"Do you know what he said to me, Xander, right before he died?"

Xander is quiet.

"I told him I loved him.  And he said, 'No you don't, but thanks for saying it.'"

He thinks for a minute.

"Well, that sounds like our self-deprecating bleach-blond buddy alright."

"But I did, Xander.  I loved him, just not the way he wanted me to love him.  Just like you and Anya."

Xander backs away a bit.  He looks ready to flee.

"I'm sorry, Buffy.  I can't do this now.  Can we just dance and save the talking for later?  I mean, we came here to party, but this feels like it's turning into a wake."

Look into his eye.  He's known you for a long time.  He understands the way you think.  Maybe he'll get it.  Hold his gaze.  Hold it.

The lights seem to be coming on.

"Wait a minute.  This _is_ a wake, isn't it?"

Nod.

"You brought us here to mourn…the lives of the dead."

Nod.

"Especially the two of us, Xander.  Because if you're going through anything like what I'm going through right now, then I know it's killing you inside."

He gulps down a lump and his eye waters a bit.

"My tough little Slayer."

He looks around the bar.

"You know what?  This place is perfect too.  It's like an efficiency version of the _Bronze_.  I think they'd like it, Spike and Anya would."

Hug him.  He's sweet when he's lying to protect your feelings.

"Anyway, Buffy, don't worry.  I won't blow your cover.  Let's head over to the bar, do some shots, trade some stories about our beloved deceased.  Whadda ya say?"

Nod.

***

The reminiscences go back and forth.  Spike.  Anyanka.  William the Bloody.  All those times he tried to hit you when he had the chip inside his head.  That time she wore the pink bunny costume.  That time he hung around outside your house and left all those cigarette butts behind the tree.  A laugh, a chuckle, a moment of thoughtful reflection.

This is good.  You needed this.

But it's not all you need.

Find an appropriate pause in the conversation and then ask.

"Xander, do you think their deaths meant anything?"

He looks stunned.

"Of course, Buffy.  We wouldn't have saved the world from evil without them.  How can you even ask such a question?"

He's right, but…

"I don't know.  It's like, no one here other than us seems to realize that the world was in serious peril just a few hours ago.  And they'll never know what heroes Spike and Anya were.  And then on top of that I have this feeling in my bones that, somewhere, somehow, sometime down the line evil is going to regroup and come at us again.  And then it will be like Spike and Anya losing their lives didn't even matter at all, because evil lived on.  You know what I mean?"

He stares dazedly for a moment.

"I'm sorry, Buffy.  You were rambling in Drunk-Speak, and I kinda lost you along the way."

"I just…I just want their deaths to matter, Xander.  They died and I want everyone else to know the pain inside that I feel but they don't.  We lost them and I was the one who led them into battle even though I cared about both of them and no one else here knows even an ounce of that pain except for you.  I mean, God, I _loved _him Xander!"

The room grows blurry as the tears flow freely.  He wipes them away softly.

"It's okay, Buffy.  We did what we had to do.  You're not at fault.  But when it comes to recognition, I hate to say it, but it's not up to us whether or not the world knows about Anya and Spike's heroics.  Time chooses heroes, not people."

What?  That makes no sense.  Think about it for a second.  What does he mean?  What does that imply?

"Wait a minute, Xander.  _How_ does time choose its heroes?"

"Well, it, uh…it, um…look, I have no idea, Buffy.  You were crying and I wanted to make it stop.  I was just trying to sound profound and make you feel better at the same time.  Obviously I failed."

"No!  No you didn't.  Actually, you just gave me the best idea."

***

Time chooses heroes the same way it chooses villains:  through stories and books.  After all, future generations would not hate the Mayor simply because he tried to sacrifice a baby to a demon in order to achieve immortality, but instead because that action was recorded as fact in print.  These generations would, in fact, not even know he had existed without such an account.

A historical account.  Giles is the man for the job.  Explain it to him carefully.

"So will you do it?"

"Of course I will, Buffy.  After all, it looks like we might finally have some time to sit down and collect our thoughts now that the First has been defeated, so I can't think of a better time to do it.  God, I've been wandering around aimlessly ever since I left you to your own devices.  I haven't even known what to do with myself.  This…this will give me purpose again."

"Oh please, as if you didn't have purpose already."

He smiles his affectionate, embarrassed smile.

"Yes.  Well, we will do this together, Buffy.  We will speak to all of the Slayers and construct as accurate an account of this war as possible to assist future generations who might have to fight any new incarnations of the First.  And then you and Willow and Xander and I will go through my notes and scour our memories and reconstruct as many of our previous battles as possible.  Oh, what an epic collection we'll assemble, working together for weeks upon weeks.  Won't this be fun!"

Yup.  That's the Giles you know and love.

But the hours of tedium will be worth it.  When these accounts are finished, Sunnydale will live on forever.  The sinkhole will be filled.  Spike and Anya and Mom and all the others you loved and lost will live on.  All of them.

They will live on, and the pain of missing them shall be dulled both by sharing it with others, and by reliving their glory.

And then you can go home again, any time you want.

END


End file.
